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GOLD PRICES slipped below $1250 per ounce for the fourth time in 2 weeks in London trade Wednesday, losing against a strong US Dollar as the White House moved to impose 10% trade tariffs on another $200 billion of imports from China and President Trump stunned a meeting of the Nato military alliance by attacking Germany for buying Russian oil while enjoying the protection of American troops and weapons against her eastern neighbor.

"No other president brings it up like I bring it up," Trump told
a breakfast meeting of Nato leaders.

Despite
'safe haven' headlines across financial media however, the giant SPDR Gold Trust (NYSEArca:GLD) shrank again on Tuesday as gold prices fell, recording its 8th outflow of investor cash in the last 9 sessions and needing less than 800 tonnes of bullion backing for the first time since August last year.

Nearest US competitor the iShares Gold Trust (NYSEArca:IAU) has also seen investors sell so far in July, shrinking by 22.5 tonnes since its record peak of end-April to need 266 tonnes of bullion bars as of last night.

By proportion that matches the 8% reduction in the GLD over that time – the giant ETF's fastest 10-week shrinkage since the end of 2016, beaten only by the record pace of outflows seen during
the gold-price crash of 2013.

With the Dollar rising faster against the Chinese Yuan than against gold last night, premiums for gold on the
Shanghai Gold Exchange edged up towards $5 per ounce – still two-fifths below the typical incentive for importing bullion from global trading hub London and suggesting weak demand in the world's No.1 consumer market.

"Rupee gold prices have risen this year by around 5%," says Metals Focus, with last week's drop failing to take gold below the "psychologically important Rs.30,000/10g threshold" for consumers in the No.2 market.

"This limited the potential for investor bargain hunting. [Now] the onset of the monsoon also marks a seasonally weak period for local precious metals demand."

President Erdogan of Turkey – gold's No.5 consumer market – meantime joins Trump, Germany's Angela Merkel and the UK's Theresa May today for the Nato military alliance summit in Brussels,
offering to lead anti-terror work in war-torn Iraq ahead of assuming command of the Very High Readiness Joint Task Force in 2021.

Sworn in this week as executive president with sweeping new powers, Erdogan has begun appointing
a "risky and daring" choice of senior ministers according to one Turkish commentator, including as finance and Treasury chief his own son-in-law – implicated 3 years ago in
oil-for-cash sales made by terror group ISIS.

Adrian Ash is director of research at BullionVault, the physical gold and silver market for private investors online. Formerly head of editorial at London's top publisher of private-investment advice, he was City correspondent for The Daily Reckoning from 2003 to 2008, and is now a regular contributor to many leading analysis sites including Forbes and a regular guest on BBC national and international radio and television news. Adrian's views on the gold market have been sought by the Financial Times and Economist magazine in London; CNBC, Bloomberg and TheStreet.com in New York; Germany's Der Stern; Italy's Il Sole 24 Ore, and many other respected finance publications.

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